Survivors
by 4th of Eleven
Summary: Written for me challenge: Shepard died in ME2, Liara's reaction.


Title: Survivors  
Fandom: Mass Effect  
Categories: G, fShepard/Liara mentioned, character death (fShepard)  
Disclaimer: Mass Effect and all characters, locations, ect. remain the property of BioWare. No copyright infringement is intended.  
Summary: Me_challenge #3: Shepard died at the end of ME2. Liara's reaction. 

The message was anonymous.

Messages from Cerberus always were. There was never anything in their brief updates that would tie them to her, never anything that could be used to prove they'd sent them.

There was a part of her that focused on that anonymity, that tried to believe the message was a fake, or some sort of deception. Sometimes, it seemed like that part of her was the only thing that let her keep her functioning.

She couldn't cry. She hadn't felt anything since she'd first seen the message.

Every morning she forced herself to read the message again.

_Cell Lazarus mission successful. Threat to human colonies eliminated. Heavy losses suffered. List of casualties attached.  
_

There were almost two dozen names on the list. A few Liara recognised. She didn't care. A few of them she'd considered friends. She didn't care. Sometimes she wondered if she would have even hesitated a moment to sacrifice them all if it could have prevented one name appearing on that list.

_Cmdr. Shepard, J. – KIA_

Every morning she closed the message and tried to focus on her work. It was impossible. The other day, she'd realised she'd spent two hours reading a single sentence in one of her agent's reports over and over, trying to work out why she could ever have considered such things important.

She looked around her office. Not two weeks ago, Shepard had been here. She'd stood there, alive, reborn. Liara had saved her, sold her soul and Shepard's to Cerberus rather than let her lover die.

And then what had she done? She'd ignored her, sent her away convinced her obsessive quest for the Shadow Broker was worth more to her than what they'd once had between them.

A distraction, she thought. That's all it had ever been. Information brokering, the Shadow Broker, the invisible network of informants she'd collected – it had all been just a way of distracting herself, stopping herself from remembering Shepard was dead, from realising just how slim a hope Cerberus had offered her. And it had worked. It had worked so well, that she was still distracted from thinking about Shepard even when Shepard had walked in her door.

It could still be a fake. It could be a lie. She tried to convince herself, but the hope was fading. She'd been given a second chance, and she'd squandered it. She wasn't going to get a third.

There was a beep at her office door. She'd never gotten around to hiring a new receptionist. Acting automatically, she signalled for the visitor to come in. It would be so easy, she thought, to fall back into her job, bury her feelings again-

Her heart stopped for a moment as she saw the human woman enter her office.

_Shepard_, she almost whispered, before realising her mistake. This woman was older, her hair showing signs of grey.. but, Goddess, the face, those eyes, they were the same…

"Dr. T'Soni?" The woman asked. "Captain Hannah Shepard. I believe… I believe you knew my daughter?"

Liara nodded, trying to remain calm. How could she face this woman now? What could she want to say to her?

"I always had my suspicions there was more to my daughter's death than most people knew." Hannah said. "A lot of your old crew were shocked when you didn't attend her funeral, but I wondered if you knew something they didn't."

Liara almost wanted to laugh at the absurdity. She hadn't known anything – the day of the funeral, she'd been heading to Omega, clinging only to a shadow of a hope.

"I have my own sources of information, Dr. T'Soni." Hannah continued. "I have heard rumors my daughter survived, that she was on a covert mission. Some of my sources are now reporting her death. I need… I need to know if this is true, or just another deception?"

I don't know, Liara wanted to say. There's still a possibility…

She looked into the face of the human captain, and her tears were all the answer Hannah Shepard needed.

Hannah blinked back tears of her own as repressed grief finally overwhelmed Liara. Sobbing, Liara felt the human's arms hold her in a comforting embrace, and she felt the captain's uniform grow wet with her tears. She remembered being held the same way years before, Commander Shepard comforting her after the Citadel battle, when the reality of her mother's death had finally sunk in for her, and another wave of grief wracked her.

"Goddess, how can I… I…" she murmured, barely able to speak.

"I know." Hannah said softly. "I know."

"I'm so sorry, Captain… Shepard." Liara said, blinking back another wave of tears as she spoke the name.

"Please, call me Hannah." Captain Shepard said. "I… please, I know how hard this must be, but can you tell me anything?"

I let your daughter go to her death while I remained safe here in my office, Liara thought bitterly. I let the woman I loved walk away without even a goodbye.

"She was investigating the destruction of human colonies in the Terminus systems." She said finally. "It was the Collectors. I believe… she tracked them to their main base. She… she fell there."

"The Collectors." Hannah said, her voice sounding distant even to herself. To know her daughter had been alive after all, but to only learn it after her death… She wanted to break down and cry herself, but forced herself to remain some composure.

"They're not the real enemy, though, are they?" Hannah asked finally.

"No." Liara said. "Just allies of them, like the Geth. The Reapers still out there… somewhere."

"How can we hurt them?"

"I... I don't know. Without a ship…" Without the Commander, she thought. "I don't see how."

"I have a ship." Hannah said. "If there's anything we can do to hurt these monsters, the Orizaba is yours."

"The Alliance-"

"To hell with them. If they hadn't spent two years dismissing everything my daughter said, maybe she'd still be alive. If I'm still around when this is all over, they can hang me as a renegade if they like. For now, all I want is revenge."

Revenge, Liara nodded. It was a good word. Not a healthy thing, of course. But what else did she have left? It was something she could feel that wasn't grief.

She saw the determined look in Hannah Shepard's eyes, an expression so similar to her daughter's, and tears again overwhelmed Liara.


End file.
